MANILA, PHILIPPINES– The third installment of the three-part online forum Communities of a New Future centered on reimagining the future of creative hubs.
Together with panelists Wendy Teo of Borneo Laboratory, Kenneth Biunas of DTI- Design Centre of the Philippines, and Sara Pepper of Creative Cardiff and Clwstwr, the seminar aimed to answer the question of what role creative hubs play in eradicating barriers that divides us.
The Covid-19 pandemic affected all sectors of society and people from different walks of life. Not only did it impact health and economy, but it also brought out issues to light such as exclusivity.
Caroline Meaby said that despite all these cultures still brings hope to all people and this is where creators and artists can play the fundamental role of promoting resilience and well-being.
The newfound situation brings all to rethink the new normal. Teo emphasized the need to change our perspective to a global scale. By this, it is only right to be more conscious and holistic in producing creatives.
Rethinking the public realm means rethinking the way things are done from public relations, communication, and art performance to inspire hope.
This point is reiterated by Pepper who stated that creative hub leaders need to step up to their role in understanding how the events right now are unfolding and how to support the communities in making them ready for the future.
Biunas pointed out that data literacy is a key skill to fashion ourselves with. He underscores the creative data literacy method that makes sense of data to prioritize and highlight categories that helped in making actionable plans and aspirations.
“Data is vital. Data is a currency of power that enables to predict and influence our next action” Biunas says. This is how organizations can keep themselves relevant, using data not just for fact-based decision making but also in exploring and working towards uncovering future possibilities.
Data literacy also means recognizing important information and communicating it to domain experts and hub leaders by creating a culture of data-driven minds with the goal of building better communities.
With data literacy becoming one part of the new normal, Pepper invited everyone, especially creative hub leaders, to reevaluate, rethink and reimagine the world right now.
This opportunity that presented itself gave the advantage to see the potential futures of creative hubs. Pepper drove her idea into three main points. Responding to the changing nature of work, importance of continuous improvement and innovation, and opportunities to supercharge collaboration and engagement.
She stated that there is a need to rethink the way people work right now, where they work and how they are doing it. She encourages to reposition the social, economic, and cultural benefits to be available to hubs and their communities.
The need for creators, and hub leaders to collaborate in rebuilding the future necessitates new sets of policies that would encompass what the world is facing right now, to which Pepper redirected to look at the Well-Being Act of 2015 in Wales that obligates everyone especially leaders to evaluate their decisions and what repercussions it will have for future generations.
The most important role of creative hubs at this juncture is to be the catalyst in defining the changes of work and in supporting organizations in transitioning to the new normal. To significantly address the new challenges the world is facing such as loneliness, well- being, mental health, and work culture. This points not only to the economic issues as we transition from massive lockdowns to plans of re-opening nations, but most importantly to caring for the most human needs of our people. To work towards acknowledging, empathizing, and addressing concerns of loneliness, well-being, mental health, work culture and eradicating barriers.
The big picture was summarized by Teo: a need to answer the call of change. In a new state where issues demand for global answers, what is necessary is to encourage communities to start thinking deeply and study situations, the root, the implications, to connect widely and act daringly.
